My work often takes me to the Antwerp diamond quarter (especially the vault buildings) and the sentiment I see there is that your general Jewish person facepalms every time they hear Israel is in the news again and they aren't happy this makes life more difficult for them by simple association. Most of these people just want to live their lives and have no association, fealty or favor for the country of Israel, beyond the area it resides in hosting holy sites.
Dunno about the traditionally dressed Hasidic Jews in Antwerp though, I've been in and around the Diamond Quarter for 25 years now and I don't think I've ever even got as much as a hello or acknowledgement of existence from any of them walking down the street. They seem to be a rather insular bunch.
Pretty much. That and they’re the sort of “I’m an evangelical Christian because my mother was and her mother was” types and don’t think much more about it than that.
It is perpetually disappointing the extent to which so many people who claim to be Christians fail to understand even the CliffsNotes version of the Gospel.
Jesus’ arrest was probably bound to happen sooner or later though. As noted Biblical scholar Andrew Zaltzman has often pointed out, Pontius Pilate was a law and order administrator, and Jesus was absolutely guilty under the law at the time.
You all can have your little LARP and potluck, but kindly leave the rest of us the fuck out of it. I get that the world sucks and thinking someone will give you cookies for taking all the shit rich folks pile on you day after day is appealing, but it’s just excusing your own exploitation. I’m not about that life.
I feel like the stigma of sin is vastly overplayed when it’s just an element of being human. Adultery and murder are the same as existing? Alrighty, almighty!
Valhalla seems pretty chill, I’ll look forward to seeing you there… or maybe I’ll go chill with my pa in the sky people’s city. Honestly, I think I’d probably want to be an afterlife tourist… I wonder how early I need to book that.
Also, without Jesus’ arrest and crucifixion, he wouldn’t have died and been resurrected, saving everyone’s souls. So shouldn’t Marjorie be thanking Jews for that?
And when the flying spaghetti monster flew out of his butthole and pasta for our sins we were saved a second time. Making humans the most saved beings in this universe at least.
the smell test is irrelevant. This is a conversation about whether the scientific / historian community is at a concensus on the historical existence of the person in question.
really, mine and your individual opinions are also irrelevant, because even if both you and I never existed- the historical, academic consensus suggests the guy lived.
I’m happy to be the bad guy in that conversation because it’s really not me thats on trial here - it’s your personal faith/belief, that’s as vulnerable to subjectivity as a belief in the spritual Christian (or Hindu, Muslim, Jewish, etc) deity’s existence.
I am not commenting on whether I believe Jesus was a deity, nor am I commented on whether I personally believe there was a real Jesus as political and historical figure at the start of the Common Era - I am saying that to say definitively he did not exist is a faith/belief based assertion, and it’s misinformation to claim it as a fact, it is a belief/opinion that flies in the face of established, peer-reviewed consensus.
You are performing a sleight of hand here by saying “Jesus” and shifting between which one you are saying is real. “Historical” is a statistical no brainer as I stated above. You then shift to equate that guy to the supernatural founder of Christianity.
We (atheists and skeptics) securely say “Jesus the miracle worker and son of God” did not exist. The proof is not there. We fail to accept the proposal of a deity or reports of miracles. No faith involved.
Others use faith to claim the opposite.
It is bit like saying the garden of eden existed because DNA proved a mitochondrial Eve.
that the terms weren’t clearly defined in the original comment is not my fault, and equally you could’ve said that you don’t believe in the divinity of Jesus - which is a very fair statement, but note how it self-defines belief and separates it from categorical fact.
Too much sophistry and you can prove that Santa Claus exists and Joe Biden doesn’t.
You did not at any point specify you were talking about the divinity of Jesus, you just said he didn’t exist- which the simplest response is “ok so who’s the guy with long hair on a cross in every church then?” - obviously in many definitions of “exists” - he exists, including that it is generally accepted that he lived as a real person.
You’re also addressing me as if I’m saying Jesus was a diety. I am not.
Well, again, I ask you - where’s your sources? Me and another guy provided a source that also contained sources. I would genuinely like to read the first-party or academic sources for your argument for my own education.
Virtually all scholars of antiquity accept that Jesus was a historical figure, and the idea that Jesus was a mythical figure has been consistently rejected by the scholarly consensus as a fringe theory.
Scholars differ about the beliefs and teachings of Jesus as well as the accuracy of the biblical accounts, with only two events being supported by nearly universal scholarly consensus: Jesus was baptized and Jesus was crucified
I’m leaving this one to the experts. If you don’t believe the them that’s up to you to prove. I personal don’t believe either of us is more informed than they are.
It can be summed up as, “People who have made their livelihood around a potentially fictitious persons of history all claim that said person exists because reasons.”
this conversation is split into so many parts im just trying to chase down this one key point: it’s not enough to say “well I don’t believe them” - I want to be proved wrong here, for my own education. But I want to be proved wrong - with proof. Not just a throwaway comment of “they have not met my (undefined, and unexplained) threshold of proof”
What do you have to show that Jesus didnt exist as a real human? That isn’t your own belief or thought process as your primary source?
You can’t be proved wrong. Noone can ever prove that someone never existed, but you can prove that someone did exist. If you have such proof for the existance for jesus, please share it.
Check the talk page on that (and similar) articles. There are some very zealous editors making sure that they come down harder than the sources really support on the “everyone definitely agrees that he existed” side of the argument…
To call this “Historical Jesus” is misleading at best. It is reasonable to say DOZENS of people fit that description.
Let’s try the same argument today… “A preacher named John was baptized and later was convicted of serious crimes and sentenced by a judge.” How many fit this description? Isn’t it more likely true than false? What does that prove?
This whole argument tries to equate mundane statistics with miracles. It adds nothing to any reasonable discussion outside of post-hoc theological justification.
The thing is that people are basing the magical sky wizards manifesting himself as his son as this “Jesus” character they’ve made up and have decided existed in the way they pretend because there is some tangential corroboration somewhere.
The earliest set of Pauline epistles have a consensus dating around 50, 20 years after the nominal death of Jesus.
The gospel of Mark has consensus dating to 70, 40 years after the nominal death of Jesus.
Multiple Jewish and Roman historians wrote about the existence of Jesus, who weren’t all getting their information from the Bible. There is a long and well-sourced Wikipedia article on this.
...and Pontius Pilot was one historical figure we can prove exists. In letters from Rome telling him to stop genosiding so many Jews. We are supposed to believe that if this really happened, such a guy cared what the Jews thought, and would give them a choice on who to kill? Really? He would have killed Jesus, the other guy, and the crowd for good measure.
It's clearly written to absolve Rome of any guilt since they founded the religion and all of the source material is more likely attributed to Mithra and Simon Magus.
I don’t understand this headline. If you believe the Bible how is it it a myth that the Jews handed over Jesus to be killed?
You have to pay attention, the headline isn’t talking about the Jews killing Jesus, but rather HANDED OVER which is precisely what happens in Mathew 26:47.
There’s no confusion about why Jewish leadership arrested and handed him over either, they were involved in a conspiracy to do that in order to get him killed. This is blatantly clear in Mathew 26:3.
I absolutely despise MTG but surely I’m not the only whose noticed that this whole article is twisted?
The woman is batshit crazy but my comment wasn’t really about her; rather how the headline is about one thing while the article itself is about something different.
The Jews didn’t hand over Jesus. A HANDFUL of Jewish state leaders did.
This. Someone who had amassed enough of a following while calling out authority figures for hypocrisy, greed, and corruption is going to make some very particular enemies.
Okay, but so what? People who are alive now and have had nothing to do with any of that (made up nonsense, btw) should tolerate these comments why? What’s even the point of bringing it up? She’s a U.S. congresswoman ffs, not a religious scholar. Her only point in doing this is to create an “other” to hate, and I hate that about conservatives the most. The underlying conservative identity is based on nothing but hatred of some boogeyman, which conveniently changes each election cycle or generation.
It’s antisemitic to blame “The Jews” collectively for handing Jesus to the Romans. The people who handed him over were Jewish, but then, so were Jesus and most of his followers. Most jews at the time, and obviously all jews since then had no involvement in the matter. But there is a long history of blaming all jews for the death of Jesus.
If MTG had said “Jewish leaders” handed Jesus to the Romans, there wouldn’t have been potential antisemitic implications. But she said “the Jews” did it, which can be interpreted as antisemitic.
Religion is the greatest evil that has ever existed, and has caused more human suffering than anything else. So I’m finding it very difficult to care that you’re hurt that she’s saying your fairy tale killed her fairy tale. You’re children, arguing over imaginary friends and running to the rest is us like we’re supposed to feel sorry for you.
We seriously need to ban religion from politics, policy making, and any matters that have to do with making rules for society. Religion should just be a personal matter, and never mentioned in public by people who need it.
Jesus was a Jew named Joshua who was against money lending in the temple.
That’s the historically accurate Jesus though, and not the M16 wielding anti-Semite white Jesus, who’s look seems to say “WTF IS A KILOMETER!!!” as eagles swoop on high.
Well Pilate DID literally wash his hands of the whole thing. Plus blaming the Romans undermines the whole “If he did nothing wrong why didn’t he comply with law enforcement?” narrative.
The Romans are gone and their Empire has been dead for longer than anyone has been alive. The Jewish people are still around and have their own State…which is continually in the news because they keep behaving like they still live in the Old Testament.
It is exhausting, but at least it gives me an opportunity to laugh at this crazy lady, as long as I don’t spend too much time thinking about all the other people who agree with her.
So wait. Given the Republicans just ‘trapped’ the Democrats into voting for the stupid ‘working definition of Antisemitism’ as a federal guideline, can we flip the table and trap them into a vote to censure/eject her from Congress?
I’d bet there’s a non-zero headcount among the Republicans who’d be happy to boot her, and if not there’s a lot of headlines to run about the “GOP defends virulent anti-Semite in own party”
A Gallilean philosopher and ex-slave was teaching a class on Paul, known Christian.
"Before the class begins, you must get on your knees and worship Jesus Christ and accept that he is the greatest deity ever, even greater than Jupiter Optimus Maximus!"
At this moment, a brave, patriotic, Centurion who had served 30 years duty and worshiped the Emperors every day stood up.
"Who is the son of god?"
The arrogant philosopher smirked and smugly replied "Jesus Christ, you stupid pagan"
"Wrong. It’s Augustus Caesar. If it was Jesus Christ, as you say... then why did he die pathetically on the cross instead of creating an IMPERIVM SINE FINE?"
The philosopher was visibly shaken, and dropped his chalk and copy of the Gospel of Luke. He stormed out of the room crying those crocodile tears. The same tears Christians cry for the conquered Gauls and Britons (who today live in such luxury that most even visit baths every week) when they jealously try to claw justly earned riches from the deserving legionaries. There is no doubt that at this point the "learned" Christian wished he had joined the auxilia and become more than a cultist preacher of barbarian superstitions. He wished so much that he had a gladius to disembowel himself with due to the shame, but he had none for he himself had always preached unconditional pacifism!
The students applauded and all joined the legions that day and accepted the Emperor as their lord and savior. An eagle flew into the room and perched atop the SPQR symbol and shed a tear on the chalk. The 12 tables were read several times, and the Emperor himself showed up and sentenced all Christians to die in the Flavian Amphitheatre.
The philosopher lost his tenure and was sent to the lions the next day. He died with a thunderous applause and was tossed into Tartarus for all eternity.
Which brings up a question I’ve yet to have a Christian answer properly for me- Why did Jesus live and die in a backwater rather than bring his world-saving gospel to Rome?
I mean even ignoring the fact that Jesus never got around to telling the indigenous people in places like Australia that he existed and humans had to do it, going to Rome seems like it would have been the best place to spread the message at the time.
It walks a very fine line that appeals to both Christians and non-Christians. It's more about the drama and struggle around Jesus, without ever directly addressing his divinity or lack thereof. Judas has all the banger songs, though. He's the protagonist, really.
I learned long ago that there is no point in a response to such Christians because they want you to respond.
And I should add that there are plenty of Christians who are absolutely not like this. Even evangelicals. My wife’s evangelical family has never been anything but completely welcoming of me. No one has so much as tried to convert me, let alone said anything antisemitic.
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